The Community of Discipleship // Mark 3:6-22 & 31-34

Well, two city shirts, whether you are here in Winston or you are down in Lexington, good morning. If you're new, it's a great time to be new. And it's because we're in a brand new series and we're gonna kind of all be new together. I tell you this all the time. I don't think in terms of Sundays or sermons, but in terms of series. Type two turn to Mark chapter three. I'm gonna meet you there in a few minutes. Guys, we're in a series called disciple, okay? And I gave you a definition last week and hopefully you can memorize it and meditate on it, but it's this idea that what it means to follow, what it means to be a disciple is to follow Jesus and help others find and follow Jesus. And here's what we're gonna talk about today. Today we're gonna talk about discipleship and community. And here's the big idea. You can't follow Jesus by yourself, okay? You can't follow Jesus alone. Now I like golf. I love golf, but Christianity is golf, okay? Golf you can do by yourself. Golf you're playing against yourself. Golf's about course management. Listen, Christianity is more like baseball, right? As soon as you say that you play baseball, what's the next question someone's gonna ask you? What team do you play for?

And if you're like, I don't play for a team. It's like, this is awkward, okay? You're not a baseball player, right? Who do you play catch with? Who do you do batting practice with? You can't play baseball by yourself. Listen, it takes a church to raise a Christian, okay? And so what I wanna do, I wanna give you a real practical application, okay? If you have been around our church for a while, you've been kind of orbiting, but it's time for you to land here. 'Cause that's the case for some of you. I wanna tell you real quickly about our weekender. Our last weekender of the year is gonna be before the summer, I should say. It's May 16th and 17th, okay? So before you start going on vacation and Memorial Day and all that kind of crazy stuff happens, I wanna encourage you to consider coming to our weekender real quickly what it is not. It is not a membership class, okay? You can pursue membership afterwards. But the whole idea is we want to get two cities in you before you get into cities. And we say here this all the time. I really believe this. We're the church for anybody. But we're not the church for everybody. We're totally fine with that.

And the weekender is just kind of your chance to figure out is this the right church for you and for us to figure out are you the right person for us? Secondly, it's not a theology class, although we will tell you what we believe and how we behave. Like I just, this is my philosophy of ministry. You should know everything about the church upfront. We're not, you're not gonna find something out eight months from now, like what? You guys believe that? It's like, no, we're just gonna tell you all the main things and the plain things that we believe at the weekender so you can decide. And it's not a connection class, but it is the only way to get connected, okay? So there's not two ways. There's not 10 ways to get connected. If you wanna get in a community group or on a server team, you gotta go through our weekender. And if you go to this weekender, we're gonna have a group connect the next day, that Sunday. And so if you go through the weekender, you'll be able to get into one of our brand new community groups. So that said, let's pray. And then we're gonna look at Mark three, Jesus and community. Let's pray. Lord, I just wanna pray right now

for people that are in this building, but are not really in this church. And that you're calling to their believers and they need to be connected to a local church. Whether it's our church or another church, I pray that every Christian would realize a Christian needs a church, like a human needs a home. And you would give them the brothers and sisters in Christ that they're going to need. We ask this in Jesus' name, amen. All right, well, just like you, I'm guessing like most of you, I'm really into podcasts, right? I mean, how many podcasts are we all listening to nowadays? It's like everywhere, right? So I'm listening to this podcast and there's these two guys talking and these guys are not Christians, but that's okay, I believe in common grace, right? All truth is God's truth. And these two guys are talking and they're diagnosing modern people and you're a modern person, okay? So this will be helpful and I'm a modern person. So here's what they said. They said modern people, so you expect way too much from two relationships. You expect way too much, get ready for it. Don't act like this isn't true, okay?

You expect way too much from a romantic relationship and your career. People think if I could just find the one, the one, the one, right? If I could find some woman I could find some man and if I did that and then if I could find the right career I just gotta get into the best schools I can get to, I gotta get educated, I gotta work hard and then if I found the right career and I found the right person, I'm gonna be happy. It's interesting that even the secular world's critiquing that by the way, whenever you finally get your career, all you're gonna find over time is your career is interfering with everything else you wanna do in life. You're like, it's interfering with my kids and my spouse and my life and my hobbies and today we're gonna talk about relationships, okay? And here's why, you need a lot of relationships if you're gonna walk with Christ and your marriage is gonna get better if you're not turning your spouse into a God. She and he is not on the other side of life. You're designed to have many relationships. Guys, big idea today is discipleship happens in relationships. I'm gonna give you a second definition, but don't worry, it's super easy. Remember, last week following Jesus, helping others find and follow Jesus. I'm just gonna say that every week.

This week I'm gonna give you a second definition. I don't know, I only write my sermons one at a time, so I don't know, next week I'll be in a definition, but here it is, okay? This one's super simple. This is what do you do when you meet with another Christian? Like what should you do? Yeah, meeting with a Christian in the church, what should I do? Open Bible, open life. Come on, it doesn't get any easier. It's four words and two of the words are the same. (congregation laughing) Our definition is three different words. That's it, open Bible, open life. And guys, I want you to understand that's at the heart of our church, that's at the heart of Jesus' ministry. Jesus' discipleship was life on life. If you've ever wondered, it's like, you know, what am I doing up here? I'm opening my Bible and opening up our lives together. That's what I'm doing. I'm like, hey guys, do you see what it says? And isn't that true in your life, you know? Or guys, look at what the college is doing, it's crazy, but look, it says that they would do that right here, right? Let me tell you this, the quality of your experience at two cities church or any church is gonna be contingent on

your willingness and ability to open up your Bible and open up your life, you know? It's like, you need to open your Bible and open your life, and then you need to find a few people that will also open up their Bibles and open up your life. Okay, here's what we're gonna do with the rest of our time together. We're gonna look at five relationships Jesus had. I think this is fascinating. I think you're gonna find a fascinating too. I think the first service found a fascinating, okay? Five relationships, I'll just give 'em to you 'cause some of you take notes and then we'll hit 'em, okay? It's gonna be Jesus' relationship with critics, okay? Jesus' relationship with the crowds, Jesus' relationship with the demonic, Jesus' relationship with his disciples, and finally, Jesus' relationship with his family. All five of these relationships show up in one short chapter. We'll get started, look at verse six of chapter three. So we're in chapter three, verse six. The Pharisees, and you know, if you grew up in church and you hear about the Pharisees, you're like, ah, they're terrible, right? We'll get to them, okay? But here they are, here they are again, right? Following Jesus around, but not really following Jesus. The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodias.

Now, we don't ever hear about them, but don't worry, we'll talk about them, okay? The Herodians against him, how to destroy 'em. So let me give you the background 'cause we're doing it, we're, you know, grab your parachute again, here we go, we're parachuting in to, you know, a passage of scripture. So here's what just happened. I want you to know what just happened. You can read it for yourself, but in verses one through five, Jesus goes to church when it's time to go to church. Not a bad idea. So he's at church, they call it synagogue, but he's at church. And at church, he heals somebody. Now, isn't that, like, isn't that what we pray for? Isn't that at the top of our list? Like, all right, we're here. Let's pray for some people to get healed. So here's the background. Jesus heals somebody and the Pharisees get angry. Welcome to the critics. I wanted to introduce you to the critics in the church, okay? And some of you, and I love you. Hear me say this with warmth. Some of you are critical. And the reason, by the way, the reason people love to be critical is 'cause they can keep things at a distance. Some of you, you're critical about the songs. Some of you are critical about the sermons. Some of you come here and you act like it's an airport,

and you people watch, and you're critical of others. And I want to invite you in, listen, there's three types of critics. I want to show you this. This is so, I had never seen this before. I'm gonna show you three critics, and I was reading this. I was reading this, and I was like, I cannot believe it. I know this is the word of God, but I cannot believe how relevant this is. Okay, first critic is a religious critic. You see that, that's the Pharisee. And the religious critic doesn't understand grace. See, we wanna be, I said this many times, we wanna be a church where a person's life can fall apart. We do not want your life to fall apart. We hope your life doesn't fall apart. Your life can't fall apart in a religious church. Here's what happens in a religious church. Think of these synonyms when I say the word religion. By the way, when I say religion, I know Christianity's a world religion, I get that. I'm using it in the narrow wooden sense of it, like legalistic, moralistic thinking, okay? In a religious church, or in a religious home, some of you have religious homes. Everybody is pretending, and everybody is performing all the time. And no one can be honest about the struggles and the temptations in the sins in their life. Have you ever seen this at a religious church?

I've seen this. Someone finally has the, with something that's dark. And in a religious church, when that goes public, they don't know what to do with it because there's no grace. So they just condemn the person and then guess what happens to everybody in the church? They have this conversation with themselves. Whatever I'm struggling with is now going to go submarine. Because if that's how they treat that person, I could never bring something up. We have so much to talk about there. I got to move on. But the religious people, they don't understand the grace of God. The Pharisees didn't like Jesus because there's three reasons real quickly on this. They didn't like Jesus because of who he associated himself with. I'm summarizing the whole gospels. They also didn't like Jesus because he was growing in his influence. But they mostly didn't like Jesus because he critiqued them. And good teaching and good preaching must always constantly critique the religious critical spirit. Second type of person is the Herodians. Now this is interesting. What's the root word of Herodian? It's like when I was in college, we asked this one guy. He wasn't the smartest guy. We said, what's the root word of momentum? He said, Mom, we're like, no, moments, moments. Get them. Okay. Okay. What is the root word of Herodians? Okay. It's not hero. Okay. It's Herod. So this was, this is interesting. This is where like, I was just having a party in my mind and heart as I was studying. Wait a second. So the first people who are critical of Christians in Jesus are going to be Pharisees, religious people. I knew that. I knew that Jesus. I knew that the second people are going to be political leaders. I didn't know that. I mean, I knew that. I just didn't see that. I just saw it with Texas first time. So here's the interesting thing about this. Why didn't, by the way, the Herodians hate the Pharisees and the Pharisees hate the Herodians because the Pharisees didn't like Roman influence and the Herodians were all about the Roman government and they come together because they both see Jesus as a threat. Now, why did, listen just for a second on this, why did the Herodians see Jesus as a threat? Okay. Because, and you may not have, you know, we have such wrong ideas about how the churches stay interact and we, we all need them, like a theology of this. Okay. And we're going to get it. But basically, here's the thing. Every totalitarian government on earth has heard this statement, Jesus is Lord as a political statement. Someone say there has never, that is the most foundational political statement. Well, it certainly has political implications.

Jesus Christ is Lord, which means you're not king. And this is why, let me think about it, guys, what happens in a totalitarian dictator state? Think just for a second. It's not a coincidence. There's never allowed to be a church. Or if it's a church, it's a goofy state church that they don't teach the Bible, right? Because to say Jesus is Lord means there's somebody over me. Listen, this is important. The Pharisees don't understand grace. And the Herodians don't understand kingdom. These are key ideas that Christ has a kingdom that is greater and broader. And to come to faith in Christ, you have to understand the grace of God and the Lordship of Christ. But there's a third group drop down to verse 22. We're going to come back, but I, it all, it all comes together. You got to see this. This is where I was like, this is amazing. Verse 22. And the scribes, the third critics who came down from Jerusalem, they were saying he's possessed by Beelzebel, which is like the incarnation of Satan. They're basically not just saying he's demon-possessed. They're saying he's so bad he's devil-possessed. Okay, look here. He is possessed by Beelzebel. And by the prince of demons, he cast out the demons. Okay, listen. Religious people attack Christ in the church. Sometimes political leaders attack Christ in the church. We see this. The third group, academic elites. I was like, I can't believe it. It's right there. The Bible is not what happened. It's what happens. I'm like, this is what's happening today. This is, this is the Harvard tenure professors of the day. That's who the scribes are. They are the best of the best of the best. They went to the best schools. Now this is, this is again, guys. If you look at the text, the verse I just read, you'll see something that it takes a second to see it. But how do the academic elites criticize Jesus? Answer by trying to tell us who he is. I was like, whoa. And I'm like, this is exactly what happened to me in college. I'm two years old in the Lord. I'm brand new believer. I ended up going to Elon University, and I got my W.W.J.D. bracelet on, and I'm like, "I love the Lord," and I'm just like new in the Lord, and I'm like, "I had some electives that I could take." And I'm like, "That's it, I'm gonna take New Testament one." Massive mistake. And I go in there as a brand new believer in my professor,

who I'm actually friends with on Facebook still. True story, true story, strange. But anyway, he spent the entire semester telling me Jesus wasn't who I thought he was. And Jesus wasn't really who he said he was, but these words are really what he said, and he was really a Galilean peasant. He was really an example, and you could get what I'm saying. If the religious people don't understand grace, and the political, Herodians, people if they don't understand kingdom, the academic intellectuals, they don't understand truth. All right, they're ever educated above their intelligence. They have more degrees than Fahrenheit, all that kind of stuff, okay? So here's the thing, Jesus speaks to the critics, but I wanna move to the largest group that followed him. Let's look at the crowds, let me show this. We'll go in verse, we're gonna go back to verse seven. Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the sea, and a great crowd followed him from, and you can see in verse seven, I won't read all the names, but in verse seven, we are told of seven different places, great crowds followed Jesus from. Notice it doesn't just say crowd, it'll say this again. It says great crowd, in fact, the word crowd is gonna be used three times in this passage. Great crowd, like, or mega crowd is used twice. Okay, have you ever wondered, I think we've all had this thought before,

maybe not all of you, but I think a lot of us, have you ever wondered what it would be like to be famous? 'Cause Jesus, we'll talk about this, he has a short period of time where he gets to be famous. He goes from obscurity to popularity. See, I think, maybe this is a younger person thing, but I just find, you know, there are 12 year olds who are hoping to go viral on YouTube, right? There's like, there's something in us, and we wonder, what would it be like to be famous? Well, we're gonna see what Jesus is. Well, partly being famous comes with lots of critics, we already talked about that, but I wanna talk about the crowds. Let me read you one more verse on this, here, verse eight. When the great crowd heard all that he was doing, they came to him, and he told his disciples to have a boat ready for him, probably Peter's boat, because of the crowd, lest they crush him. So you get this image, seven different areas, massive crowds coming, for he had healed many so that all who had diseases pressed around him to touch him. Okay, this is interesting, I think it's very interesting. So the crowds come around him, and so here's what I'm thinking, what do you do when the crowd shows up? Because we know, I mean, the crowd was just here at Easter, if you didn't know that. And in one sense, the crowd's here every week. You know, there's like just so many people,

there's like, you know, who's really a believer? And he said, I just can't tell. I can't tell, I'm like, who's in the crowd, who's really a believer in it? I don't know. So let me tell you how Jesus responds to the crowd. It's been helpful for me as I think about this. The first thing he does is he recognizes that the crowds were following him, but not for spiritual reasons. So think about it this way. The Pharisees didn't really know who he was, and they hated him. Then you get to the crowds, and the crowds don't really know who he is, but they love him. But they don't, you know, they like the free healthcare. They like the free meals. They like the free entertainment. Well, let's go, let's follow this guy. He heals people, and he might, you know, might get a kid's meal out of this or something. You know, their kids get fed the night, or something like that. So they can, okay. But here's what's interesting. Jesus did three things with the crowds that I just want you to know, we're just committed to doing here, okay? The first thing is he taught in parables.

Let me explain what that means. So this will mess with you. If you ever like, you know, there's, I had a professor, I took a side story, I didn't tell a story at the night, just can't even hear it now. I had a professor, well, I took a couple of classes at Duke Divinity when I was there, and I had a professor there who said he decided to become, to get his PhD and to go into teaching the Bible for a living because of what Jesus says about parables. Here's what Jesus says about parables. I think it's in Matthew 13. Jesus, his disciples at one point go, "Why do you teach in parables?" And he goes, "So no one will understand me." You're like, "What?" Isn't that the opposite of teaching? And here's, there's a lot of deep stuff for that, but let me tell you this. Jesus said he taught in parables so that the crowds by themselves wouldn't be able to understand because he wanted to see if they wanted more. Do they want to talk about this anymore? Do they want to read the Bible for themselves? The larger the crowds got, the harder his teaching got. So you can follow this, like he has a, he's not popular for very long,

'cause of what he's teaching. So, but like when you're talking about, when he's talking about a New Testament sexual ethic, divorce, remarriage, huge crowd. When he's talking about the dangers of wealth, massive crowd. And then in John chapter six, which is from what we can tell, it's kind of the climax of his ministry, like in sense of popularity. That's where he says, remember he says, I'm the bread of life? And all the gluten-free people go, oh, you know, it's like, no. But he's designed the bread of life, and that's kind of warm, it makes you feel warm and fuzzy. And then he says, eat my flesh and drink my blood, or you have no part of me. And it says, at that point, many walked away. And remember, that's when the disciples come up to him and say, and he's like, are you leaving too? And he says, I'm not leaving. Or Peter says, where else do we go? You have the words of eternal life. The third thing he did with the crowd, so he taught them to see if they want more. He taught harder, the bigger the crowd got, which is the op, I'm just telling you, the temptation, right? As soon as something gets big,

it's like, we need to hire a brand manager immediately. You know, to make sure we don't offend anyone. Everyone needs to come back next week, right? He doesn't, the third thing he does is he draws lines, not circles, you know, we tend to wanna draw a big circle. We're all the same, we all, you know, Goomba, let's sing Goomba for a few minutes together at the end of the service. And when he does, the bigger the crowd, he goes, some of you are going to heaven, some of you are going to hell. Some of you are sheep and some of you are goats. Some of you have repented, others of you are going to die in your sin. It's like. So the critics don't really know who he is they don't like him, the crowds. They love him, but don't really know who he is. And then we're going to be introduced to the demons. Or if you want to keep it all sees, the cursed. Okay, here we go, the cursed. Let me show you this. Verse 11, this is real quick. And whenever the unclean spirits, okay, so that's demons, saw him, they fell down before him and they cried out, you are the son of God. And he strictly ordered them not to make him known, okay? So if you're new to Christianity, welcome, we believe in the supernatural, we do. There's no way to explain our faith

apart from the supernatural. We don't believe that all that you see is all that there is. Here's what we believe. We believe that there is a scene realm and an unseen realm. And what we see right now is the scene realm what we don't see is the unseen realm. Heaven and hell, angels and demons, all that. Now here's what's interesting, 'cause we're not going to spend a lot of time on the demons, but I want to tell you this. The demons are the only people in the gospel accounts, Matthew, Mark and Luke and John. The demons are the only people except for Jesus. Who knows who Jesus is? Isn't that interesting? Here's what I want to encourage you. Remember what I said? If the critics don't know who he is and they don't like him and the crowds don't know who he is, but they love him. The demons know who he is and they hate him. And here's the interesting thing, every demon has better theology than you and me. Every demon has perfect, airtight, biblical, and systematic theology. The problem is they don't love what they know about Christ. So what's interesting here is, this is what has perplexed scholars, is Jesus looks at the demons who are supernatural beings proclaiming that he's the Son of God, which is correct.

And he tells them to be quiet. If you want a big phrase for your Sunday morning, it's what's called the Messianic Secret Motif. It's the whole idea that Jesus wants to tell everybody in the right time who he is. But I also think the whole idea is the demons don't love him and he doesn't want people talking about him and telling others about him who don't love what they're saying. So we talked about the curse, we talked about the critics, we talked about the crowd. Now we're gonna talk about the disciples, or if you want another see, the core, okay? This is who he spent almost all his time with. Let's look here. Says this, "And he went up on the mountain "and he called to him those whom he desired "and they came to him." So here's a good way to think about Jesus' ministry. And by extension of your ministry, Jesus loved the world, helped many, discipled a few. Think about his whole ministry. He goes and weeps over Jerusalem. He loves the world, he dies for the world. He helps many. Pass by, help this guy, teach this crowd. Decipaling a few people now it says he goes up to the mountain if you want the longer account of this you can read Luke chapter 6 In Luke chapter 6 he tells us he went up to the mountain and he prayed all night We assume he's praying for his disciples because he's about to pick them But he goes up to the mountain mountains are a big deal in the Bible Basically you go up in the to the mountain to meet with God and gain new perspective, right?

That's what you do you go to the top of the mountain. Oh, I can see farther than I've ever seen that's kind of hold you So he goes up there and he's praying for his disciples We know that because of Luke chapter 6 and then let me just read this to you one more time It says this he went up on the mountain and called to him those whom he desired and they came to him, okay? So Jesus picks his disciples, okay, so I don't do this a lot But just one minute on it because I do think it's important just at the heart level to understand this at the end of the day Why are you a Christian? Are you a Christian because you're smarter than your non-Christian friends? Is that is that right? You're gonna be like got you God at the end of the day, you know, that's why I'm in heaven Like if everybody was like you they'd all be Christian. I guess right It's like no, I don't think so. It's like you know, you're more spiritually sensitive wish everyone was like you If everyone was like you then they'd all be Christians because they'd be as spiritually sensitive as you Maybe you're just more interested. That's what it is. You're more interested in the things about it. No, no ultimately God picks us and then I know you know, well, I picked him he picks you then you pick him. That's how it works He draws you decide all it So all I'm saying is we get this beautiful picture of Jesus deciding by the way you get to pick who you disciple Just as a person like and there look I believe in suffering And I believe in sacrifice and I believe in service But if you've never ever disciple someone before why don't you just pick somebody you actually like You know that you don't have a terrible nickname for and all that kind of stuff like you're like no I you know, I would be I would actually be excited about the cycling this young lady or this young man Well, let me show you what he does here. Listen important. He says verse 13 verse 14 now He appointed 12 whom you also named apostles really quickly. Why 12? Well, think about this with me 12's kind of a random number like if you just think about numbers, you know, I guess it's a dozen I'm saying but like it's not 10 right or it's not even a more biblical number that like you have 40 40 You know days on the ark and 40 days in the wilderness with Jesus. It's like it's 12 Well, if you know your numbers, what is 12? Well, just follow this for a second There's a guy named Abraham and he has a son named Isaac who has a son named Jacob who has 12 sons those 12 sons become 12 tribes

those 12 tribes become the nation of Israel and that's basically the books of Genesis and Exodus, okay, and So Jesus is re gathering the people of God symbolically in the 12 disciples He's now gathering the people of God around him now. Let me show you why he's doing this. Let me show you this Here's what it says It says he appointed 12 whom he also named Apostles so that they might be with him and he might send them out to preach and have authority to cast out demons. So I believe This moment right now for Jesus is the second most important thing he does Think about it. We know the most important. We sing about it. We celebrate no question Sinless life substitutionary death victorious resurrection like we know that's That his cross work is the most significant thing he did I Think most would agree the second most significant thing Jesus did Was pick 12 men? To invest three years of his life in Humanly speaking we don't have any churches today if Jesus doesn't invest in these 12 men So I want to talk about it says he calls them in to send them out, right? The church is both we want to I hear this word Charitably we want to collect Christians, but to commission them out We want to gather them to scatter them. That's what Jesus does here. Here's something to think about Jesus calls the disciples to relationship and responsibility I'm calling you that you might come in and be with me that I then might send you out now Here's the problem with you, and here's the problem with me. Tell me if I'm wrong just think about this today We tend to think about Christianity think about your Christianity whatever that means for you your Christian walk your Christian faith Here's my guess you tend to think about it. You may not say it like this. You tend to think about it in regards to time and place Not relationship and responsibility - Thanks, Goldie. [BLANK_AUDIO] It's a 7/3. I sit in this chair 30 minutes, or you think like, oh, no, no, I got my--

I go to the 9 o'clock service, or I go to the 11 o'clock service, or I go to the 5 o'clock service, and I got my hour and a half, and I serve every other week. So then it's 3-- I go to community group. It's Tuesday. It's 6 to 8. It's like, OK, I get all that. But what if you just thought-- with the people in your community group, and hopefully you're in your community group. I'm just committed to these relationships. And I'm committed to the biblical responsibilities of one another, and in these relationships. And that happens outside of just simply two hours on a Tuesday or Wednesday night. Let me give you another principle of discipleship, because I want to get real practical. That's just for a second, OK? Because a lot of us-- like I said, week one, we've never-- discipleship hasn't been defined, and that's a problem, so we defined it. But also, maybe the bigger problem for some of us is it's never been displayed. So most of the things you really need to learn in life are caught, not taught. So I'll tell you, this happens all the time in our church. There's a young couple, and they get married, and they're both new in the Lord. And they're brand new believers.

They became believers in the last couple of years. They get married, and then they end up having a conversation with one of our pastors, or one of our staff. And it's very similar all the time. It's like, we don't know how to be a Christian couple. And part of the reason-- this is how it always works. Part of the reason is, well, I never saw it. And then the husband goes, yeah, and I never saw it. And then what happens is they have kids, and they're like, well, how do you do a devotional with a four-year-old? Mm-hmm. And they're both like, well, my dad never did this. Well, yeah, me either. It's like, OK, I've never seen it, right? So this is why hospitality is such a way of discipleship, because you invite people into your life. By the way, let me encourage you. Minister and disciple out of your life stage and your lifestyle, you'll enjoy it way more. You like-- so I want to talk to the young moms for a second, who are just overwhelmed, and you're just so grateful that someone else is watching your kids right now, OK? By the way, always show up to our kids' ministry with hugs and gift cards, and just thank the people that are doing that, I'm serious. But I want to talk to young moms for a second, because basically, that's a life stage. And you know what?

The best thing to do as a young mom is to invite a bunch of young, single ladies over to spend time with you as your mom. One, because they're going to get to see what it's like to be a young mom. And two, they're going to be a lot of help. And genuinely, they're going to enjoy it, because they're going to get to leave, 'cause it's over. Go ahead, I'm here for two hours. I'll help, you know, then I go home to my life, OK? So I just want to encourage you that. In some of you, you like to go to the gym, or you have hobbies, or you like to hunt, or fish, or golf, it's like, man, how can you do what you're doing, but do it with gospel intentionality? I want to encourage you. I know sometimes I comment, I'm like, you know, this needs to change, that needs to change. I think for some of you, you don't need to change your whole life. You need to begin to invite more people into your life. I mean, it could be so, hey, I'm going grocery shopping, and I got an hour. You know how many young people have never, like, how do you think about grocery shopping? How do you think about meals? What do you feed your kids? How much do groceries cost, right? Here, guys, we know this. The one place discipleship, and I'm using that word elastically, but the one place discipleship still happens today

is the medical profession. And I say that, 'cause a lot of you in medicine, it's like, think about it. It's like, things are taught, but things have to be caught. And so it's like, all right, you have to do good on organic chemistry, but you also have to just, like, spend eight years in a hospital. And you have to follow people around who know what they're doing. And you do medical school, you do residency, you do fellowship, and then finally, you know what I'm saying? It's like, so I just want to encourage us, guys. Now, let's look at it. Let me show you the disciples real quick. We'll get them. They're actually mentioned here. And he appointed the 12 Simon to whom he gave the name Peter, James, the son of Zebedee, John, the brothers of James, to whom he gave the name Bo and Ergus, that is, sons of Thunder, Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James, the son of Alpheus, and Thaddeus, and Simon, the zealot, and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him now, I'll tell you something interesting. Well, interesting to me. My initial plan, like I had it in my mind, I was like, here's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna preach a message on community and discipleship, and the whole message is gonna be the names of the disciples. And I was like, and I'm gonna talk about this Judas,

and then I had this whole idea in my mind. And I sat down to start studying it, and here's what I found out. We don't know anything about seven of the disciples. How much time is he going to spend on Judas, you know, it's like, so here's what's interesting. I say that to encourage you, think about this, the 12 men that Jesus Christ spent three years of his life with. We don't know like anything about seven of them. I mean, go ahead and you couldn't even name them, right? I mean, I just read them. I'm like, "I already forget," right? Here's what's interesting. Judas is always mentioned first, Judas is always mentioned last because Judas is the betrayer and Peter is the leader. They're named in two pairs. We think that potentially those are the two by two that Jesus sent out. That's kind of neat. Other than that, we don't know anything about the, like think about, you're like, "Okay, doubting Thomas." Yeah, that's all you know about him. We know a little bit about James and John, mostly Peter and Judas. He has a little interaction with Nathaniel and John's gospel. We don't know anything about this and here's why I'm telling you that. Some of you feel like you are just completely unknown. You're like, "I don't go on Instagram and I'm not going to be on the stage and I'm not going to be a community leader and I don't know, I'm trying, but you know, I don't feel like anyone knows me. I want to encourage you because Andy Davis said this news here last year, last summer. He said he thinks heaven and he knows more Bible, or he'll forget more Bible than I'll ever know.

I mean, this guy knows the stuff, but he basically said, "I think in heaven, we will be celebrating the advancement of the mission of God by celebrating the lives of every individual in heaven and I think we might spend the most time on the people we know the least about." So there will be a time where we'll hear the story of those seven and we'll hear your stories. Here's another interesting thing you can tell, a couple other quick things. You can tell, even in the description there, he renames several of them. So Simon gets to be called Peter. He calls the other guy, Sons of Thunder. Basically, this is a very diverse group. So here's what we know. We only know for sure that Peter was married because his mother-in-law's mentioned in another place. So Peter's married, but there's also single guys. So there's probably married and single guys and they're doing life together somehow, figuring that out. Peter's probably more blue collar, Sons of Zebedee, more white collar fishing, dad-owned's business, all that kind of stuff. So you've got different socioeconomic things going on. You have Simon the zealot who we know like nothing about except these zealot, which hated the government, and then you've got him and then you have Matthew the tax collector. So all I'm trying to say is Jesus brings together people that otherwise would never hang out with one another. And I love it. I love it when like two guys that are Christians find out they have three hobbies, you know? Guys get real excited about that. You like to hunt too? You know what I mean? I like that coming. But I think it's even more, and I think that's great, that happens all the time.

I think it's even more beautiful when you see two guys or two girls or some friends hanging out, you're like, "You're like the odd couple." You know what I mean? Like the only reason these two guys hang out, they're so different is Jesus is what's brought them together. It's really, really powerful. So, okay, let's continue on because we need to look at the last guys, the last group mentioned. Here it is. Verse 20 in 21, "Here's this family. When he went home, and the crowd gathered again so that he could not even eat. And when his family heard it, they went out to seize him for they were saying he is out of his mind." Okay. So, remember, we talked about the critics. The critics didn't know him, didn't love him. We talked about, you know, we talked about the crowds. The crowds didn't really understand him, but they loved him, the demons. They knew about him, but they didn't love him, okay? We saw the disciples. They were learning to love him. Now we have his family. Now, it's interesting is this is the first mention of his family in the gospel of Mark because in the gospel of Mark, there is no birth narrative like we get in Matthew and Luke. So, it's like, "All right. First time Jesus' family is mentioned, what are they going to think? He's crazy." By the way, I want to encourage you, maybe you're a seeker, maybe you're a skeptic, I want to encourage you that I think one of the endearing parts of the Bible is its honesty. If you were going to make up a story about some guy being the son of God, you wouldn't

say, and his family thought he was insane. You'd be like, "He did miracles at home." You know? Everyone thought he was cool. So it's very honest. Now, I want you to watch. We've got to drop down to see this. I want you to watch Jesus' interaction with his family. Okay. Look here. So, then he went home. I'm in verse 20 again. I want to read this. And the crowd gathered. I want the different groups again, the crowd gathered again so that they could not even eat. And when his family heard it, they went out to seize him for they were saying he is out of his mind. Now, they were most likely concerned for his safety because they saw the critics in the crowds. So I think they were very worried about their own. back then. And I know the family is important to us, but we view ourselves much more individually. This is like, when was the last time you introduced yourself and used your last name? If you did, you're probably over 50, okay? Because we live in a first name culture. I tend to think of myself as Kyle, not as a Mercer. In that culture, you are a Mercer way before you're a Kyle. And the family is of the utmost importance. And so they're worried about his safety, they're worried about his sanity, probably because it's old C.S. Lewis, liar, lunatic, Lord. Either Jesus was lying and knew he wasn't the son of God. He was a lunatic and said he was the son of God. Thought he was, but he wasn't. Or he's Lord. That's what it's saying. So now I need to get to his international family. Here it is,

verse 31. "And his mother and his brothers came and standing outside, they sent to him and called him." And the crowd, there's the crowd again, was sitting around him and said to him, "Your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you." Look at this. And he answered that. So this is Jesus speaking for the first time about his family. Who were my mother and my brothers? And looking about at those who sat around him. He said, "Here are my mother and my brothers for whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother." Okay. I want to tell you something. And this is really the big idea. I've given you a couple of big ideas, but this is the big idea. Jesus defines and redefines every relationship in our life. He just redefined family. And here's why this is so powerful. There is probably not a more basic relationship and a more fundamental question that you can ask somebody that, "Who is your mom and who is your dad and who is your brother?" I mean, we could afterwards go down the kids' ministry area and we could grab a bunch of three-year-olds and go, "Hey, guys, you're three and you just learned how to talk." Okay. So just do it. But even though you're three and even though you just learned how to talk, who's your mom? And who's your brother? This is my brother. This is my sister. What I'm trying to tell you is when Jesus comes into your life, he changes everything about your life. And he redefines. He basically defines the church as the family as well. See, when you are born, you're born into a family. And when you're born again, you're born into a new family. If you're a Christian, you have a family of birth and you get a family of new birth. And here's the thing. I just want you as we're going to close and sing some songs and head it away. I want you to think about this for a second. What is your relationship with Jesus Christ like? So American evangelicals are famous for talking about having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. And I've used that language. Do you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ? Here's the truth. From one perspective, every person, or may I say this way, Jesus has a personal relationship with every person. He is the Lord of every person. So here's what I want to ask you. Do you have something in your relationship with Jesus need to change? Some of you, you need to stop being critical and you need to come to Christ. Let me give you a person in the Bible, Nicodemus, who comes out from the Pharisees and begins to ask questions and says, "What does it mean to be born again?" Some of you, you need to come out from the crowd and you need to come to Christ. You need to move from being a fan to being a true follower. You need to be like Zacchaeus, who he's up and he's watching and he comes down

and says, "I got to do this." But I think the encouraging thing, because you read the story I just read there at the end and you go, "Oh man, his family doesn't understand his brothers don't believe." Or later told in Acts that his brothers believe. And so wherever you are, whatever you currently believe about Jesus through repentance and faith, that can change. Let's pray. Lord, we talked about a lot of relationships there. All the different relationships here in Lord, we need relationships. What I pray that we would be a church where we open up our Bibles and open up our lives. Jesus, we pray that we would follow you because you are the risen Lord and we would help others find and follow you Lord. Lord, would you call us more deeply to both relationship and responsibility in your church? We pray this in your name. Amen. You